My Victorian horror mystery, Calista, is now a movie !!
Not quite. 😉 It has been optioned but that is a nebulous future considering that these film projects take decades to take off. Only the most enduring will play at that game. I’ve indeed seen options renewed yearly over a span of a decade while directors change and nothing gets up. Sigh.
For now I am creating art for the novel because it deserves it. ♥️ Plus it’s fun for those who love visuals.
I love this early scene where French detective Maurice Leroux steps out of the carriage that has brought him to Alexandra Hall. The thing with employing Sora for imagery is that you end up blending your historical fiction writing with both art direction and an entirely different cinematographic language. It is intensive but well worth it. It took me three hours to get this picture just right. I love being able to share my world, and give a more vivid glimpse into a gothic story that I hold dear.
This next image is straight from the first chapter of the novel. In which we find, a terrified Vera Nightingale attempting to get some shuteye while reminiscing on the last years, not least, of knowing her brother's strange Greek wife, Calista. Dearest Calista is a village girl from Corfu and to Vera she will always be a peasant, despite her regal appearance in the portrait. The night in Alexandra Hall promises quite a few surprises for Vera. And what is it with those silver spoons on the staircase? Well, you'll have to read the novel to find out.
Next up we have this kitchen scene depicting Maurice Leroux as a child...
I admit, I was itching to feed this idea into Sora. It is Maurice Leroux's dream sequence. Here we find a childhood memory back in Paris, growing up in the post-terror. Save that the terror is domestic...
As with all dreams, the imagery here departs from the gothic and enters surrealism.
Thérèse Leroux wears her French cockade well, don't you think? In the novel, she even threatens Maurice with the guillotine.
Well that is all from me. Short and sweet!
Calista is available in Kindle, paperback and audiobook format from all Amazon territories. It can be purchased almost anywhere online. Alternatively, readers can borrow it from the National Library of Australia and from the BnF in Paris.
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